Pleasantville
by PascaleDeBom
Summary: Where everything is pleasant, friendly and kind. Where swearing is unheard of and emotions never run high. Where colour isn't a word with meaning, because everything is gray. Where no one has any questions, and everyone will always stay.
1. Chapter 1

_**Pleasantville**_

_Where everything is pleasant, friendly and kind. Where swearing is unheard of and emotions never run high. Where colour isn't a word with meaning, because everything is gray. Where no one has any questions, and everyone will always stay._

**Chapter One – **Goodbye and Welcome

"Kurt!" a loud shriek after he'd heard the door of their apartment open made him close his eyes and breathe deeply. "Breathe, Kurt. Just breathe." Kurt told himself, looking away from his laptop as he awaited his door to open. Loud bangs of footsteps were heard in the hall and without a knock, his bedroom door flew open. It was Rachel. Roommate and best friend, obnoxious at times but always there with a listening ear… well maybe not always. "You are not going to believe this!" Rachel's happiness wasn't exactly infectious. Kurt hadn't had the best of days and just wanted to chill and watch TV. Without waiting for Kurt to ask why Rachel was so incredibly upbeat, Rachel sat down on his bed, her face almost bursting with joy as she smiled.

"Finn is coming over tonight!" she again shrieked. With a soft smile, Kurt looked at his friend. "That's great," Kurt didn't mean what he said. This meant that his step-brother would just come in and bother him about his love life once again. Joke with messages his Dad had asked Finn to pass on to Kurt. There was nothing to talk about. Kurt was gay and the fact that he was comfortable with it didn't mean that the boys that he had crushes on did too. In fact, Kurt was sure that every boy he'd set his eyes on had either been straight or locked in a closet and too scared to ever come out. He smiled at Rachel because he was happy for her, but he wasn't in the slightest happy with Finn coming over to the apartment. "I've missed him so much, you have no idea!" Rachel exclaimed, flinging her arms open wide as if she was on a stage and had to make sure everyone knew how happy she was with seeing her boyfriend. Kurt smiled to himself and rolled his eyes as his best friend got off of his bed and stood in front of his life size mirror.

"I have no idea?" Kurt huffed. "Are you forgetting that I'm the one that's always in earshot of your skype calls?" Kurt joked half-hearted but Rachel waved his comments away. "It'll be great, he can be here any minute now!" she said, dashing off into her own room. For the sake of being a good friend, Kurt didn't ignore her all together. "Where are you taking him?" he called out, wondering to which restaurant Rachel would take Finn. The last time Finn'd been here, they'd all gone to a fancy restaurant in the city which had been fabulous until Finn learned that he is in fact allergic to shellfish which Rachel had insisted he'd try for his starter. Never had a nice dinner taken such a tragic turn.  
"Nowhere, we're eating in, I've already ordered Chinese on my way home so it'll be here in time." Rachel answered and Kurt silently groaned. It'd be bad enough with Finn staying over, but those two on the sofa all night was something Kurt was definitely not looking forward too. Thank God he had a television in his room so he could at least shut himself away and watch his favourite TV show without being bothered by them.

Suddenly Rachel appeared in Kurt's doorway again, now in a complete different outfit, holding a hairbrush. She painfully looked at Kurt and took a breath before speaking. "Kurt I hope you don't mind but I'd appreciate a bit of privacy…" she let the question linger, hoping that Kurt would get the message. Not looking up from his laptop, Kurt nods. "Don't worry I will shut myself in my room and you won't see me for the right of the night."

When Rachel doesn't speak or move, Kurt looks up to see her, still with that same painful face. "I meant… it'd be nice if Finn and I could be, you know, completely alone." For a second Kurt just looks at her. Is she being serious? For what reason would they need the entire apartment, and more importantly, his room?! Then it dawns on Kurt.

"Ooh no! No, Rachel! I am not going to sit in a bar somewhere just so the two of you can, so you can have se- … intercourse!" Kurt yells matter of factly, offended by the question. Rachel immediately starts pleading.

"But Kurt! Please? It's not a huge question, you can just call…. You can, just call…" Rachel is searching for a name, someone close enough to Kurt for them to send an evening together, but she can't think of anyone. Kurt doesn't really have any other close friends in The City apart from her. "You don't have to go sit in a bar by yourself," she eventually says, but Kurt knows what she wanted to say. He knows what she means, and hurt by the confrontation he shuts his laptop and gets up.

"You are not doing this to me, Rachel Berry. This is my apartment too, and this is my room, you can't tell me when to leave and when to come back!" Kurt rages. "If you want to do dirty things with Finn," Kurt scrunches his nose even thinking of it. "You can go and book a hotel room for the night," Kurt says finally and passes Rachel as he leaves his room and walks into the kitchen.  
"Please Kurt, you don't understand, it's just that-" and before Rachel can even finish her sentence the doorbell rings. Both stare at it for a minute.

"That must be him." Kurt says, looking at Rachel and not moving a muscle. Rachel sighs defeated and goes to open the door. Only it's not Finn, it's the Chinese she ordered. As Rachel pays the delivery guy, Kurt takes his chance, grabs some food from the fridge and heads back into his room where he turns on the TV. Only a couple minutes now until his favourite TV show starts. He's been looking forward to this all day and neither Rachel nor Finn is going to stop him from relaxing in his room. Kurt had the worst day and sighed to himself as he sat down.

Here in New York, he was nothing special. People knew gay and accepted it and the idea of it is so great because all Kurt ever wanted was to be accepted. Not to be made fun of and not to be bullied. For the first couple of days, weeks even, it was the closest to heaven Kurt had ever felt. But then he reached a point where he realized that Kurt wasn't interesting. He was nothing new. People didn't notice him – he was just one a million and even though it's a horrible thing to say, he hated it.  
"Kurt!" Rachel again shrieked after the front door closed. She appeared in his doorframe again.  
"Don't you understand? I'm asking you a minor favour and-" But before Rachel could finish her sentence, she'd been shushed. Kurt held his hand up to her face, and even though they were too far apart to even touch, Rachel abruptly stopped talking as suddenly all Kurt's attention was focused on his TV screen.  
"Pleasantville?" Rachel exclaimed, staring at the TV just like her roommate did. "Is this seriously the reason why you don't want to go out and give me and my boyfriend some privacy?!" Rachel couldn't understand. Why didn't Kurt just go and make some friends? Why couldn't Kurt be the sociable Kurt she'd become friends with in high school? What was wrong with him? But Kurt understood. Right as he appeared on the screen, there he was, gelled back perfectly styled hair. Very 50s. And so handsome.

"Kurt you can't be serious!" Rachel cried. "There are so many re-runs of this crappy black and white show, why can't you just miss it once?!" Rachel was angry, but she begged. When Kurt didn't even seem to notice her anymore, she'd had enough. She knew he'd get angry, she knew that she might go too far, but it'd be the only thing she could do to get his attention. And so she did it. Rachel marched to the small TV, and turned it off pressing the big button. It didn't phase Kurt, which annoyed Rachel even more as Kurt just used his remote control to turn the TV back on. The next best thing Rachel could do was unplug the TV, which made Kurt look at her in disgust.  
And so they started. Kurt got up from his bed and started screaming at Rachel. She didn't wait for him to be done talking but screamed right back at him. Yelling back and forth, both only focusing on what they were saying rather than what the other was trying to say, they screamed at each other like a brother and sister would, neither of the two willing to give in.

In the heat of the moment, neither of the two friends had noticed that the TV had turned back on. Except it wasn't Pleasantville that popped back on the screen… the screen turned bright orange. And then green. Then blue. Still neither of them noticed a thing, far too caught up in getting all of their anger across. Suddenly they stopped screaming and the room was no longer filled by loud voices, but by a weird other loud sound. The second it started, both Kurt and Rachel had to cover their ears as the high pitch hurt their eardrums. They both stared at the TV, in panic.

"Kurt, stop it!" Rachel tried to scream over the sound, obviously panicking. "I'm not doing anything!" Kurt yelled back. Rachel looked at the TV and realized that she had to do something or else the sound would be too much for either of them to take as it slowly got louder and louder. Trying to turn the TV off, it didn't work and Rachel didn't have enough time, her ears didn't allow being uncovered for more than a second. Loud bangs on the wall were only soft thuds but Kurt could hear them and realized that the neighbours wanted them to stop the shrieking, piercing sound that came from his TV. He looked at the plug, but saw that the TV was still unplugged and in sheer panic started screaming as the sound became too much for his ears to take. Rachel joined him as they both collapsed on the floor, both hands still on their ears.

Suddenly there was blackness. No sound or sight, with no warning. Everything was black.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two –** Bring me back

Just as quick as everything went black, everything was back to normal. Sight and sound were back and for a split second Kurt felt relief. But his relief vanished when he took a second look.

Sat on the floor in his room, in front of the TV, everything seemed the same… but it wasn't. In fact, nothing was the same. Yes, Rachel was there, but she looked different and was dressed different. In pure shock, Rachel stared back at Kurt. Kurt swallowed thickly and as he tried to understand what was happening, they heard a voice.

"Kurt, Rachel, breakfast is ready!"

Both stared at where the voice came from, and then looked back at each other. Neither of them knew what to say, yet both of them had an idea of what was going on. But it couldn't be... it'd be far to absurd for their crazy thoughts to be actually true.

"Kurt…" Rachel started, panic filled her voice. "What is…. How did we, how did we get here?" she looked around the room she was in. It looked like Kurt's room, but at the same time it didn't look like Kurt's room at all.

"I don't know…" is all Kurt managed to say. Kurt took a glance at the TV which seemed to be a much older model. Vintage. Suddenly he felt a finger on his cheek. It was Rachel, who had one hand covering her mouth as she was about to start crying from sheer panic. She started wiping Kurt's cheek harder and harder as the tears started falling from her eyes. "Rachel," Kurt stopped her, taking hold of her wrist as Rachel let out a sob. "Kurt you're gray! You're in black and white!" Rachel panicked. "I know," Kurt was surprisingly calm.

"Children? You better hurry or you'll be late for school." Again that voice that seemed to come from downstairs. It startled Rachel's crying. Kurt slowly got up from the floor and walked to the door. He walked past a mirror and stunned, he stopped to look at himself. He was indeed black and white. As if someone had turned grayscale on and vanished all the colours away. And not just him, everything around him was black and white. It made everything match and for a second he hated it, but then he realized that everything sort of looked at peace. Everything matched… it was actually kind of, dared he think it, _pleasant_.

A noise close to him snapped Kurt away from his reflection. Rachel was fiddling with the TV, not knowing how to turn it on, she gave up and started banging her fists on the box. "Rachel!" Kurt hissed, kneeling back down next to her, grabbing both her wrists to stop her from abusing the old fashioned television. "How can we undo this? Where are we? What has happened? Finn can be here any minute, I don't-" Kurt shushed his friend. "Rachel calm down." Both sat in silence for a short period of time. Kurt knew what was going on, it was just that he knew that it was too crazy to even think it, let alone say it aloud.

"Are we in Pleasantville?" Rachel softly asked after she sniffed. Kurt nodded slowly, not sure how he got here and how he could get them back to New York. "This isn't possible, is it? How are we here? What happened to your TV?" Rachel was calm, but wanted to know a lot of things. She asked questions Kurt didn't have an answer for. A sudden presence made both of them stand up immediately.

"Children, did you not hear me call out for you?" a woman, dressed in a poodle skirt and a buttoned up blouse, an apron covering most of her outfit, stood in the doorway. "Breakfast is ready and waiting for you in the kitchen," she smiled the most friendly smile Kurt had ever seen. It was both terrifying and… maybe actually kind of nice.

The woman left and Kurt wanted to follow her but Rachel stopped him. "What are you doing?" she hissed. "I… I think I'm gonna go and have some breakfast…" Kurt said, pointing in the direction the nice lady left. "You can't be serious, you don't know who that is! Or where we are! This isn't real, how do we get back?" Rachel panicked again and started fiddling with all the buttons on the TV. None of it worked as the TV didn't turn on, nothing happened. Kurt had to stop her once again.

"Rachel listen to me. We will fix that TV and figure out how to get back to New York… right now, there's someone downstairs who is going to give us food and she might be able to help us more, I don't know, maybe she can't, but we can at least try and… fit in." Kurt finished, halfly shrugging. Rachel listened to him, but then rolled her eyes at her friend. "But we don't belong here, and how does that woman know our names? What if she's going to poison us? We need to get back!" Rachel turned her attention to the TV once again. Kurt sighed. "Okay good luck trying to get us back, but I'm gonna go downstairs now and eat some breakfast." Kurt didn't want to admit that he'd rather stay here than go back to New York. Of course going back eventually wouldn't be a bad idea, but something had crossed his mind. Or rather _someone_. Now that he was here, in actual Pleasantville, he had the chance to meet the person he admired so, and he wasn't going to let Rachel take it away from him.

As Kurt walked down the stairs, he studied what kind of house he was in. Everything looked very warm and welcoming, even in black and white. Perfect, very homely. Very traditional, Kurt thought to himself. Soon Rachel's hurried footsteps were behind him and they both entered the kitchen.

"Good morning Kurt," a man spoke as he put his newspaper down. "Ah, my angel, you look beautiful as ever." He spoke when he saw Rachel. He got out of his seat and stepped closer to the two friends, who had now learned they were in fact siblings. "Breakfast is ready, now children, hurry up or you'll be late for school." He smiled at the two teenagers, patted Kurt on his shoulder and gave Rachel a kiss on the side of her head. Rachel winced and ducked away slightly, but the man didn't seem to notice and after saying goodbye to his wife, grabbed his suitcase and was out the door.

"What are we going to do Kurt." Rachel asked, relying on Kurt's knowledge of Pleasantville. "I don't know… for now, we best just roll with what's coming at us and go to school. Maybe there's more of us here, unsure of where they are and we can help each other." Kurt said, silently wishing this wouldn't be the case. The now-siblings were on their way to school and were in awe of what the world looked like in black and white. The gray sky, with gray birds and gray trees - it was the oddest thing ever to walk around in a black and white world. Everything sort of seemed to melt together... it definitely took some getting used to. Walking down the street, neighbours waved at the two teenagers and for the sake of being polite, Kurt waved back at each and every one of them. "This is by far the strangest thing that has ever happened to us," Rachel said, looking back in confusion as people waved and smiled at her. "I know, but there's nothing we can do about it now, we just-" Kurt didn't manage to finish his sentence. "Good morning Kurt!" a loud voice had interrupted him. Kurt stopped walking, and so did Rachel. "Good morning…" Kurt looked at the man who'd spoken to him and suddenly realized who he was talking to. "Good morning Mr. Johnson, how are you doing today?" Kurt smiled. "You know him?" Rachel whispered, confused by what was happening. "Oh I'm doing swell today Kurt. Have a nice day at school. You too Rachel." He smiled, waved and got back to watering the plants in his garden.

Kurt smiled and looked at Rachel, "Yea… I do…" he said, kind of surprised himself. He looked around the neighbourhood once more. "In fact, I know each and every one of these people. Everyone's the same as in the TV show… we're not just in the town Rachel…" Kurt's eyes were back with Rachel, who didn't seem to understand what he was talking about at all. "We're not just in Pleasantville… we're in the TV show, _Pleasantville_."


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three – So Perfect**

"Kurt!"

Kurt took a second to close his eyes and breathe because he knew he was gonna get a lecture from his friend, no, _sister_, about how she has to leave Pleasantville right this moment because everything is wrong and, gosh, this girl doesn't appreciate anything - why did she even get transferred here with him in the first place?!

"Kurt!"

He would've happily gone by himself. New York wasn't even that great in the first place - everything smelled like pee, he couldn't go out at night because tramps would harrass him, asking for change for food and it was all so far away from the dreams he'd had about the place. If anything he was a little happy he was now here, in Pleasantville.

Kurt slammed his locker shut and smiled at it. The lockers at his old high school used to be gray, just like these... even though everything's gray here, but that didn't matter. It was still nice to see something that reminded him of his old home.

"Kurt! Oh my God," Rachel was now standing next to him, a smile so wide, Kurt feared it might rip her head open. "This school is the most amazing school I have ever been to, why didn't you tell me this place is so amazing earlier?" she smacked his arm with the books she was holding, maybe a bit too hard. Yet, Kurt can't help but to smile back at her.

"Really, you like it?" Kurt's confused, but happy that Rachel's not on full freak-out mode anymore. He was so ready to throw an annoyed fit at her for being ungrateful. Thank God she was actually happy. Not just happy, Rachel was _beaming_ with joy.

"Are you kidding me? Today in history class, when I knew all the answers, instead of people calling me loser or nerd or telling me how annoying I was, people were impressed and gave me compliments!" she seemed so surprised.

"I'm not obnoxious Kurt!"

"That's great," Kurt smiled, but it didn't quite reach his eyes. Not that Rachel noticed, she's far too caught up in her own story.

"I'm serious, I raised my hand at every question and I even corrected the teacher and this really cute guy just leaned over to me and told me how smart he thought I was, and he was being serious! At the end of the class I checked my back really quickly, because you know, sometimes at McKinley people would be nice as a joke and leave a kick me note on my back, but there was nothing! Kurt, I didn't have a kick me sign on my back!" Rachel turned around to show him the back of her dress to prove it.

Kurt didn't even have the chance to respond. Someone called out for Rachel and made both of them turn their heads to see who it was.

"That's my new friend, she said she liked my shoes," Rachel explained, making Kurt nod. He couldn't help but feel overwhelmed by Rachel's sudden switch from absolutely hating this place to loving it. It was great, surely, he loved to see her so happy... but he just wished that his classmates had been as accepting of him as Rachel's classmates had been of her. After hearing of Rachel's day, Kurt almost felt a bit... dared he even think it, _jealous_.

"I'm going to go over to her house, I don't know, something about milk and cookies and homework... and all the girls were going." Rachel couldn't stop smiling at Kurt.

"How nice, an afternoon with all the girls," Kurt titled his head, thinking back to when Rachel used to come over to his house when they were in high school. Together with Mercedes they'd sit at the dinner table together, all their books open and helping each other with their homework whilst having snacks and talking about boys.

"So I'm gonna go," Rachel said, snapping Kurt out of his thoughts.

"Oh yea, of course..." Kurt started. "But before you leave," he lowered his voice and took Rachel by the arm to move her closer.

"Have you noticed anything about anyone being in the same situation as we are? I mean, other people trying to fit in-" Kurt hissed but got cut off by Rachel.

"_Fitting in_." she stated. "We're_ fitting in,_ we're not trying to."

Kurt gave her a suspicious look, not sure if she really meant the both of them, or just herself.

"Right. But, anyway, anything you've seen or noticed?" Kurt tried, but Rachel shook her head. To be honest, she hadn't even been thinking much about finding a way to get back to New York... not after everyone had been so nice to her the minute they'd set eyes on her.

"Maybe I'll find out something later? I don't know what we're gonna do this afternoon, but I'm sure there will be lots of talking to each other," Rachel gave Kurt a final smile before she heard her name being called out again.

"Could you tell Mother that I'm over at the Fabray residence?" Rachel yelled as she rushed away from Kurt, leaving him at his locker.

Well, this sure wasn't how Kurt expected this day to go. His day had been very average, not at all like Rachel's day who apparently has never felt any better. And she didn't even watch the TV show! Slightly bummed out, Kurt checked his locker one last time to see if he had all his stuff. Before he left to go home, he looked around the hallway to see if there was anyone from his class. Maybe someone who wanted to invite him over to their house... but no one even gave him a glance.

At home, Kurt found himself in his room. A bit lonely and hurt, yet he doesn't fully understand why. He takes out his bags to do homework- he knows how horrible it is to not do your homework here. Everyone does what they are supposed to do here in Pleasantville, and if he wants to be welcomed by everyone the way that Rachel has been welcomed, he_ needs_ to be his perfect self.

The Kurt that finishes his homework before dinner.

The Kurt that knows exactly what he is going to wear to school tomorrow.

The Kurt that helps his "Mother" as Rachel called her earlier, with the laundry.

There's one thing that's bothering Kurt only slightly. It's not that Kurt's new mother will never be his mother, even if she so claims she is, because no one will ever be able to replace his mum. Not even Carole, even though she's always done a really good job as her replacement.

No, it's something that he realized at lunch today. It hadn't crossed his mind earlier, and he was surprised by how he hadn't thought of it before. Pleasantville was so perfect, so All-American 50s, so family friendly and _pleasant_… that nothing seemed to be real, or spontaneous. No one seemed to be adventurous, or funny, or rebellious…

And what he maybe thought was worst of all; no one seemed to be_ gay_.


End file.
